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“but I don’t know what’s going on inside your head. I always get the feeling you’re telling me what you think I want to hear instead of what’s really on your mind. Do you really believe the same things I do or are you simply parroting my ideas?”
    “Social activism as a way to pick up chicks. Thanks for thinking so much of me.”
    “You know what I mean.”
    “Actually, no, I don’t. Why don’t you explain it for me?”
    “You’re not who I thought you were.”
    “Meaning?”
    “When we first met, I was attracted to you because you seemed to have so much gravitas. I looked in your eyes and saw such depth of feeling. I wanted to explore those feelings with you. Once I got to know you, I realized your eyes aren’t the mirrors to your soul. They’re one-way, reflecting what the viewer sees instead of what you really feel. You’re about as deep as a wading pool.”
    Brittany’s words pierced Jordan’s heart. She felt like a prized insect being pinned to a board and put on display. “Thanks for that.” She stared into her lap as tears streamed down her cheeks.
    “Like I said, I don’t want to hurt you. I’m just being honest. You should try it sometime.”
    “Are you trying to say I’ve been lying to you?”
    “Not exactly.”
    “What I asked you is kind of a yes or no question. ‘Not exactly’ isn’t a valid response.”
    “Fine. You’ve been holding back. You shared your body with me, but not your mind or your soul. I don’t get where you’re coming from.”
    “I’m a fucking open book, Britt. Always have been, always will be.”
    “I beg to differ. You claim to be anti-war, but how can you be when you romanticize the role your grandparents played in Vietnam, one of the bloodiest, most misguided conflicts our country has had the misfortune of being involved in?”
    “You met my grandmother once and my grandfather died long before I met you. If I embellished things a bit when I introduced you and Grandma Meredith, I did it because I wanted you to like each other. But let’s get something straight. I love my grandparents and I am understandably proud of everything they’ve accomplished in their lives, but I didn’t know any of their service history until Grandma Meredith and I began the trip down here.”
    “Yet I’ve lost track of the number of times I’ve heard you wax rhapsodic about the fact they met and fell in love while they were in the Army. Whenever you talk about them, you’re as wrapped in the flag as they once were. I can practically hear you pledging allegiance to Uncle Sam and whistling ‘Yankee Doodle Dandy.’ You wear your grandfather’s dog tags like they’re some sort of fashion accessory when what they really are is a political statement. A statement of your true beliefs.”
    Jordan closed her eyes as she felt her life begin to spin out of control like a car that had just hit a patch of black ice. Family was important to her, but she would never allow them or anyone else to come before her principles. “You’ve said a lot of things during the course of this conversation, Brittany, but you’re right about only one: you don’t know me at all.”
    “And whose fault is that? Mine? Yours? Does it even matter at this point?”
    “It does to me. I wish it did to you, too.”
    Jordan ended the call and let her tears fall. She had been misunderstood all her life. By friends, classmates, and strangers alike. People who took one look at her exterior and expected her to be something she wasn’t. She’d thought Brittany was different. She’d thought Brittany could see her true self. How had she been so wrong?
    “Grow up,” she told herself as she knuckled away her tears. “You’re twenty-one now. You’re supposed to be an adult. Stop crying like a kid who has lost her favorite toy.”
    She took several deep, shaky breaths and tried to pull herself together as she watched Grandma Meredith talk with a group of older men crowded around a long black travel